2008-09 Season

Carnival of the Creatures

Sunday, October 26, 2008
The Music Center at Strathmore
Bethesda, MD

Just in time for Halloween – a children’s concert with a “scary” second half. The first half is all Saint-Saens, including “The Swan” danced by an 11-year-old ballerina. And we’ll have children reciting Ogden Nash’s ingenious animal poems, and the voodoo chant that inspired the black magic of Sensemaya.

Copland & the Cold War

In 1953 Aaron Copland was subpoenaed by Senator Joseph McCarthy and asked about his dealings with Communists. How did the Red Scare impact on the artistic and national identity of America’s most famous concert composer? Our program traces his compositional odyssey: from student years to modernism, to 1930s populism and political radicalism, to a cerebral “late style.”

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Iberian Inspirations

Sunday, March 1, 2009
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
Fortas Chamber Music Concerts
Washington, DC

As the major presenter of Spanish concert music in both DC and New York City, PostClassical Ensemble has long made a cause of the lesser-known works of Falla, and of the master Catalonian modernists Montsalvatge and Gerhard. We return to the Kennedy Center with a program including the American premiere of a Montsalvatge sinfonietta inspired by the paintings of Salvador Dali.

Encounters: A John Adams Snapshot

A rare opportunity for DC audiences to hear two cutting-edge compositions by an indispensable American original. Phrygian Gates, early Adams, is a landmark of keyboard minimalism, a 30-minute kaleidoscope of swirling colors and textures. Gnarly Buttons, late Adams, is a sizzling clarinet concerto distilling swing, blues, and jazz. Both works will be performed for the first time by two great American instrumentalists.